Bio

Mary Crenshaw is an American painter living and working between New York and Italy after four decades in Milan. Her practice explores themes of dislocation, memory, materiality, and the fragile construction of home. Working primarily in oil painting, Crenshaw draws on years of experience in printmaking, textiles, ceramics, and installation, creating works in which materials themselves embody memory, loss, resilience, and transformation.
Crenshaw received a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from Virginia Commonwealth University, an MFA in Visual Arts from Lesley University College of Art and Design, and a Doctorate in Fine Art from the University of East London.
She has presented solo exhibitions in the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, and South Korea, including Inhale at The Painting Center, New York (2026); Couched at Small House Gallery, London (2024); Etched in Light at Pig Prints, Milan (2023); Shipwreck at Prince Street Gallery, New York (2023); and Tanti Saluti! at the CICA Museum, South Korea (2020). Her work has also been featured in numerous group exhibitions throughout Europe and the United States and is held in the collections of the CICA Museum, Brunel University, the Comune di Truccazzano, and the Istituto dei Tumori in Milan.
Recent residencies include the PS122 Project Studio Program in New York, the Judy Pfaff Studio-Compound Residency coordinated by Michael David, founder of The Yellow Chair Salon, PasseggiAtina in Italy, CAMAC in France, and the Vermont Studio Center. She is a member of The Painting Center in New York and founder of the London/Milan/Seoul-based Waves Collective. Her work has been supported by the Clark Hulings Fund for Visual Artists and the University of East London's Professional Doctorate bursary and has been the subject of exhibition essays, interviews, and critical writing.
Drawing from personal experience as well as broader histories of movement and displacement, Crenshaw's paintings investigate the emotional resonance of fragmented imagery and material surfaces. Her work invites reflection on belonging, impermanence, and the ways people reconstruct meaning through memory and place.
Crenshaw is represented by The Painting Center in New York and Galleria L’Affiche in Milan.